Digital Music Players: A Compressed History

Which MP3 player came first? Technically, the Korean-made MPMan, which was unveiled in March, 1998, appeared first. But the MPMan was expensive, wasn’t widely available, and it didn’t work very well. Only a few hundred units were sold.

Announced in September, 1998, Diamond Multimedia’s Rio PMP300, in contrast, cost $199.95, was easy to use, and was packaged with all the necessary cables and software. It also sold more than 400,000 units, making it the first commercially successful digital music player on the market.

But the “which-was-first” debate is ultimately superfluous. It wasn’t until a court ruling on October